A longtime supporter and campaign surrogate of Donald Trump cited the United States’ use of internment camps for Japanese Americans during World War II as justification for a very controversial position being mulled over by Trump and his team.

Fox News host of ‘Kelly Files’ Megyn Kelly asked Carl Higbie, a former navy SEAL and spokesperson for the pro Trump Great America PAC, if a federal registry of Muslim immigrants would create “a slippery slope where Muslims may just get lumped into some group, where they get put in a registry, and some, you know, some aggressive law enforcement actor in the future might abuse that list?”

Acknowledging that “there is always a case for abuse,” he said that he still supports a registry which he believes will “hold constitutional muster.”

“I know the ACLU is going to challenge it, but I think it’ll pass, and we’ve done it with Iran back, back a while ago,” Higbie said. “We did it during World War II with Japanese, which, you know, call it what you will, maybe …”

Kelly interrupted “Come on. You’re not — you’re not proposing we go back to the days of internment camps, I hope.”

The former navy SEAL replied “No, no, no. I’m not proposing that at all, Megyn, but what I am saying is we need to protect American from … I’m just saying there is precedent for it. And I’m not saying I agree with it, but in this case I absolutely believe that a regional based …”

Kelly again interjected raising her voice, “You can’t be citing Japanese internment camps as precedent for anything the preside3nt-elect is going to do.”

Higbie then said:

“Look, the president needs to protect America first, and if that means having people that are not protected under our Constitution have some sort of registry so we can understand, until we can identify the true threat and where it’s coming from, I support it.”

Trump Surrogate Says Internment of Japanese Americans Justifies Controversial Registry was last modified: by Breanna Khorrami